Comfort at Midnight
by CuteVampireCollie
Summary: I am afraid. Real or not real? Real. This is one of the most terrifying moments in my life. Real or not real? Real. I love you. Real or not real? Real. And as long as we have love, we'll be okay. But the fear's still there. Katniss/Peeta. Incredibly sappy/OOC. Set before the epilogue of Mockingjay.


A/N: So this is my third Hunger Games fic already…and I still have four more ideas after this. None of them will be connected to one another, so you don't need to read any of m other HG fics to understand this one. Wow, obsessing with friends is awesome! Especially because I feel like such a psycho with how hard I obsess and my foreverlovely Avidtty makes me feel sane! –kissuhoney- Her HG stuff is amazing, too so please go check it out! :D

Any who, critique, as always is lovely and I hope you enjoy. I am wearing my lucky Mockingjay necklace as I write this so hopefully you guys think it's good. I almost think it's _too _sappy, so hopefully I didn't fail. XD; I do not own The Hunger Games. The rights and characters belong to Suzanne Collins.

...

All my eyes could see was the surrounding darkness, not even the moon shining through the window to give me anything to see with. But it's not like I was paying much attention to the darkness itself anyway. I had much more to be afraid of.

I pulled my hand out from underneath the blankets and pressed it against my swollen belly, a whimper leaving my lips as I did so. There was a living creature growing inside of me. I had always said that I would never have kids and I had always thought I would stand firm regarding that decision. But Peeta had really, truly wanted to start a family. And how could I deny him anything?

But…all the memories from before…_in the arena, _had come rushing back as soon as I had first felt her kick. The Games no longer existed. Real or not real? I took a deep breath. _Real._ But I couldn't help but be afraid. Peeta and I had grown up in such an awful, politically monstrous and power-hungry world that it was sometimes so hard to remember that we no longer lived in such a world.

I closed my eyes momentarily and when I re-opened them, I found bright orbs of blue staring at me. I moved my hand from my stomach to his head, running my fingers through his adorably mussed blond locks, then cupping his cheek in my hand. "Nightmare?" He shook his head, reaching to place his hand on my stomach. "You're still worried, aren't you?" he murmured gently. I quickly averted my eyes from his gaze and swallowed. "Yes. Yes, I am, Peeta. You mean to tell me that you aren't?"

He began to caress my tummy, his fingers splayed in such a way that felt ticklish. "There are times when I worry, yes. But the Games are over, Katniss. You don't have to worry about the Reaping Day anymore or Peacekeepers…none of it. She won't have to go through what we did." I didn't want to smile, not with the fear swimming around inside my chest, but my lips twitched upward regardless. "You still think it's a she, huh?" He nodded, chuckling.

I sighed softly, moving closer to him, burying my face into the indent of his collarbone. "It's just…still so hard to believe that the Hunger Games…that it's all over. Sometimes it still feels like we're living in that hellhole." He gave my head a gentle pat before moving his fingers through my sleep-knotted hair soothingly.

"It's still not going to be easy. How do we even begin to tell our child about what we went through, if at all? How do well tell her that her playground was once a battlefield where hundreds of people died and were buried? How can we even begin to explain that the Games are the reason we're the way we are…? It all seems so complicated. And then when I'm done fearing about how we're going to tell her all of this, I start to wonder if I'll ever make it to full-term with her." I moved my hand back to my stomach, rubbing it absentmindedly as I leaned my head back against the pillows and looked up at my husband with questioning eyes.

He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to my temple, caressing my cheek with his thumb. "When I can't help but feel mind-numbingly worried, those are the things I fear and wonder about, too. I don't know how we'll tell her. But she'll have your blood in her. You and I managed to actually make it out alive. She won't have to suffer like we did, so I think she'll be fine. You and I are."

I nibbled on my bottom lip as I contemplated his words. I knew he was right. But the fear was still there. I just…his words had been more comforting than anything I had been telling myself, but…the fear didn't seem to want to go away. The Quarter Quell arena could very adequately describe how my mind worked most of the time. At certain times, the fear would be there and it would be at its strongest. At other times, all the fear I held deep within my heart wasn't so bad.

"Would it help you feel better if I painted you something?" I blinked, surprised, before allowing a small and tender smile to grace my lips. "It might. You know how I feel about your paintings, Peeta." He rolled his eyes, grinning. "You didn't like them when I first started." "That's because all you painted were the Games."

He ran a hand through his hair, messing it up even more, and disentangled himself from me before swinging his legs over his edge of the bed. I grabbed his wrist. "Wait, what are you doing?" "Going to paint you your picture," he replied as if it were the most obvious answer in the world. Well, maybe to him it was. I looked at our bedside clock. "Peeta, it's two-o-clock in the morning." "I know." He walked out of our room and I could hear his footsteps continuing on to another room two doors down from ours, which he had turned into a little art studio years prior.

I leaned up and heaved myself out of bed -pregnant belly and all- and followed him into the studio, wincing when the bright lights made contact with my retinas. Peeta had already gotten out his brushes and a blank canvas in the time it took me to get out of our bed and follow him in here, his face serious and contemplative.

Sighing, I walked up behind him and wrapped my arms around his upper body, leaning my head against his shoulder. "So it would be pointless for me to tell you to come back to bed and work on this tomorrow, right?" He tilted his head in my direction, giving me a quick kiss. "Yes it would." I made a hum of assent, nuzzling his neck with my cheek, wrapping my arms around him a little tighter. "So can I at least ask what exactly you plan to paint for me?"

His gaze turned thoughtful. "I'm not sure yet." His paintbrush began to move slowly across the canvas anyway and soon his seemingly random lines began to form something. He painted a set of arms and I blinked, my mouth widening in disbelief as I saw more lines forming a baby nestled in the safety of the pair of arms. Peeta painted a mop of brown atop the baby's head and gave her big, stunning gray eyes, which instantly knocked the breath from my lungs.

I buried my face in his shoulder and shook my head as tears threatened to burst from my eyes. Peeta and I had gone through so many things even after the Games had ended….we had spent time healing…and suffering…healing…hurting those we loved -including each other- without meaning to…and healing some more. But I had only grown more in love with this man as the time had worn on. Only he could do something this beautiful…this wonderful…and have it nearly make my heart stop.

"If she has my hair, I want her to have your eyes," I managed to murmur in between sniffs. He chuckled softly, standing up and wrapping an arm around my waist. "Do you feel better now?" I nodded, speechless. With a gentle smile, he led me out of the studio after shutting off the light and we headed back to our bedroom.

Laying down in bed and cuddling up to him, for once during the entirety of my pregnancy so far, I realized that I felt completely and utterly content. "I love you….real or not real?" he said softly, his fingers teasing a strand of my hair into place behind my ear. "_Real_…I love you, too."


End file.
